BBVA will seek a similar amount to the 11 billion euros
($14.8 billion) that the Bilbao-based bank raised in the first
tender of this kind from the ECB on Dec. 21, Gonzalez said in an
interview with the Madrid-based newspaper. There is no stigma
for banks taking part in the central bank auction, he told El
Pais.

Banks shouldn’t ask for ECB money to invest in government
debt and instead it should be used to fix problems, he said,
according to El Pais. The ECB three-year loans will help the
economic recovery, he told El Pais.

The Spanish government bonds’ risk premium should decline
by the end of this year to below 300 basis points, he told El
Pais. If that is not the case, it means that things are not on
the right track, he told El Pais.

The Spanish-German 10-year yield spread narrowed on Feb. 24
to 316.1 basis points from 318.7 a day earlier, data compiled by
Bloomberg show.